The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities • Hacker News Board

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#181

Post by jancsika » Tue, Jun 26, 2018, 5:16 AM UTC

schoen wrote: post #121

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even ignoring the practicality part, it becomes a timing game, because "empty" messages - even if they were filled with unintelligible "random" hex - would traverse the network differently than ones with variable length/size content and would be able to be filtered out pretty quickly. The bottom line is that you are going to leave a signature of some sort through communications - the question is, can you properly bui…

> Even ignoring the practicality part, it becomes a timing game, because "empty" messages - even if they were filled with unintelligible "random" hex - would traverse the network differently than ones with variable length/size content and would be able to be filtered out pretty quickly. To eliminate the statistical observability of metadata, the padding needs to reach or exceed the maximum capacity of the channel. So…

> Clearly in this system we're not ever allowed to use it to transmit more than 1 MB per day, without destroying the metadata unobservability property.

You're also not ever allowed to transmit links or anything else that goads the user into fetching a remote resource in response to a message.

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#182

Post by boomboomsubban » Tue, Jun 26, 2018, 6:27 AM UTC

partiallypro wrote: post #94

jonknee wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Intercept is "overindexed" to the US in the same way that the Daily Mail is "overindexed" to the UK. That's the whole point.

The Intercept, though I like much of their work, has shown some sympathy with Russia and repeated things that were Russian propaganda from agencies like Sputnik and RT. Wikileaks itself is possibly even a Russian front operation.

They haven't shown sympathy towards Russia, they just don't view Russia as the sole bogeyman responsible for all troubles. Like the Trump-Russia scandal, they have reporters on the case but also point out there is similar or more damning evidence of collusion with Israel or Saudi Arabia.

Your post illustrates why they take these positions. Even an unsourced insignificant link to Russia is used to discredit anyone.

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#183

Post by coldtea » Tue, Jun 26, 2018, 7:27 AM UTC

judge2020 wrote: post #108

coldtea wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One wonders if a CDN might advertise, Yes, but they could also be lying about it.

Wouldn't it be easy to traceroute between the CDN and your server, or the CDN and your house to see if it hits servers that WHOIS to at&t?

>Wouldn't it be easy to traceroute between the CDN and your server, or the CDN and your house to see if it hits servers that WHOIS to at&t?

Wouldn't be trivial for any other telco (whether foreign or domestic) than at&t to tap the data and lie about it too?

And it doesn't have to show up in the traceroute (they could mirror the traffic, etc)

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#184

Post by krylon » Tue, Jun 26, 2018, 12:42 PM UTC

lev99 wrote: post #70

ianamartin wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a word for pointlessly bringing up quantum computation to prop up a vituosically weak set of arguments. Like Godwin’s Law, but more worse-er.

Quantum computation changes the complexity of brute forcing common encryption algorithms. It seems very plausible that actors are storing high value encrypted messages for future decoding in case QC enters the realm of possibility.

I vaguely remember reading that storing encrypted messages just in case it might become possible to decrypt them later on has been common practice in intelligence services for decades (if not longer).

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#185

Post by Famicoman » Tue, Jun 26, 2018, 2:40 PM UTC

oldgeezr wrote: post #101

puzzle wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a difference between a data center and a POP. The former is very large. The latter is usually a rack or more in someone else's facilities. When you try to reach Google or Facebook, you rarely hit their data centers directly. They're out in the boonies, where land and power are cheap. Rather, you talk to their proxies at the edge (POPs, often in large cities). From there, your data is either returned immediate…

Just curious, is there a good site/book/etc to learn how the modern internet actually works? As a lowly programmer, I have a good understanding of network communications, and some knowledge of things like routing protocols, but I'm completely lost when it comes to understanding how the modern internet actually functions. Thanks!

Tubes by Andrew Blum does a great job at introducing how the infrastructure is layed put and operates to a certain degree, https://www.amazon.com/Tubes-Journey-Internet-Andrew-Blum/dp...

That said, I would love some more in-depth books on the topic.

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#186

Post by rconti » Tue, Jun 26, 2018, 5:13 PM UTC

saosebastiao wrote: post #61

rconti wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one in the picture? Is that NY? I don't recognize the skyline.

Ctrl-F Jovelle Tamayo It's on the corner of third and lenora.

Crazy. I used to work on 2nd and Lenora and I still can't say for sure I've noticed this building.

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#187

Post by scottmf » Tue, Jun 26, 2018, 5:15 PM UTC

azinman2 wrote: post #2

I’d love to see the intercept publish the equivalent for China, Russia, etc. It feels the press has very overindexed into the NSA.

Of course it wouldn’t. Greenwald is effectively a Kremlin puppet and he’ll never admit he was conned.

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#188

Post by Latteland » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 1:36 AM UTC

frankharv wrote: post #131

mtgx wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Once they know exactly what someone has done and how, it's relatively easy for them to find alternative means of "suspecting" that person of doing the crime and convince the judge to give them a warrant for exactly what they've already found through the illegal surveillance operation. I wish judges and defense attorneys would catch on to these tactics more quickly. The rate at which the prosecutors/FBI inven…

All this assumes the judiciary is fair. I feel otherwise. When Microsoft was about to be broken up an appellate judge overruled the prior judge. That judge went on to be the FISA secret court judge. Remember that the NSA Key was discovered around the same time[0]. So Microsoft was in bed with NSA prior to 1999 with a crypto key backdoor. They were helped by an future FISA judge.(Does that background look like a natio…

I am skeptical of source #0. I thought that idea of nsa keys had been debunked. At least that source is not complete. Someone found a string 'nsakey' and they talk about analyzing the 'entropy of the source code'. What does that actually mean in technical terms that make sense to software engineers? I'm too stupid to understand that I guess. Sure, it would make sense for the nsa to try to do this. But it wouldn't make as much sense for microsoft to do it. Linux is out there now. I used to work at microsoft, and our product had a secured special bug database where we recorded security issues. We didn't want random people in the company to know that you could make your login name do string injection was an example of something we had there.

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#189

Post by hsienmaneja » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 3:47 AM UTC

ghein wrote: post #171

rdiddly wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the building has "reinforced concrete foundations" ! Wow, sounds exotic! Just kidding... not sure if they mean something else, but "reinforced concrete foundations" might be the most commonplace thing in structural engineering. (Most foundations involve concrete, and most concrete is reinforced.) So this is a bit like saying your car has a paint job. But hey I used to be a structural engineer, and unfair ballbust…

The Intercept are voluntarily acting as an arm of the FSB. Just think of them as Stalin's New York Times - willing accomplices to Soviet genocide.

This isn’t a popular place for such a viewpoint.

Re: The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

#190

Post by hsienmaneja » Wed, Jun 27, 2018, 8:14 PM UTC

txcwpalpha wrote: post #34

reaperducer wrote: post #27

I'm struggling to find the new information here. We've known for years through the New York Times and others that AT&T helps the NSA. We've known for close to a hundred years about AT&T Long Lines networks and hubs for that network. It's only basic logic to put the two together and know that the NSA uses AT&T's hubs. What's new here?

Did you even read the article? The new information is that these specific 8 buildings are specifically noted within NSA documents as the 8 locations within AT&T's network that the NSA utilizes. I don't know what The Intercept expects anyone to do with that information, but that is new information.

Releasing such info furthers subversive causes, as did disrupting active missions, having the Oahu tunnel shut down, and informing criminals and adversaries of our activities.

A privileged electrical technician torches your establishment to the ground and says he should be thanked for forcing you to rebuild stronger.